NATO’s stubbornness and reluctance to address Moscow’s security concerns sparked the Ukraine crisis, Yury Ushakov, a senior foreign policy aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, has claimed.
Speaking at the Primakov Readings international forum, named after the late Russian Foreign and Prime Minister Evgeny Primakov, the presidential aide noted how one of the veteran diplomat's key goals was to deter NATO expansion after the collapse of the USSR and to create a sustainable and fair European security architecture. However, there was no support in the West for such an aspiration, Ushakov lamented.
“Now we have what we have. The situation around Ukraine is the result of NATO’s stubbornness and complete disregard for Russia’s interests,” the official stressed.
Ushakov also remarked that as early as the 1990s, when the US was at the peak of its global power, Primakov had foreseen that the world would slowly move towards a multipolar order. According to the presidential aide, Primakov understood that this transition “would not be easy, and the US and its allies would do everything to maintain their hegemony,” as seen in the West’s “hybrid war against Russia in the Ukraine conflict.”
However, according to Ushakov, the global majority that wants a multipolar world order does not want to be in opposition to the West. “Many non-Western countries maintain partner ties with the US and the EU… but not to the detriment of their sovereignty, relations with China, Russia, and other non-Western centers,” he noted.
His comments come after Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said earlier this month that despite the West’s best attempts to turn Russia into a “rogue state” over the Ukraine conflict, numerous nations are still willing to talk to Moscow as they put their national interests first.
In December 2021, several weeks before the Ukraine conflict began, Russia presented the US and NATO with a list of security proposals to defuse tensions in Europe. Moscow demanded that NATO not expand any further, that it bar Ukraine from joining the alliance, and withdraw its forces back to its 1997 borders. The overture, however, was rebuffed by the West.